


Uneasy lies the head that wears the crown

by AuteurOnirique



Category: Black Sails
Genre: After 410 (with lots of spoilers), Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, But they're very happy with each other and they love and tease each other, Established Relationship, F/F, Fluff and Smut, It's a bittersweet happy ending, Madi deals with the aftermath and Eme is here to help, a tiny bit of angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-07
Updated: 2017-04-07
Packaged: 2018-10-15 22:25:03
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,549
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10558692
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AuteurOnirique/pseuds/AuteurOnirique
Summary: Madi never wanted this treaty. She didn't have a choice in all the things she now has to enforce, as the leader of the Marroons.But Eme is by her side, making the impossible easier.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [maerzkindt](https://archiveofourown.org/users/maerzkindt/gifts).



> Okay, so I hope this will answer the prompt and be a tiny bit what you requested! I had so much fun exploring this pairing and try to flesh out a relationship for the both of them!
> 
> I'd like to thank slowestshark for proof-reading so quickly and with so much insight! You should all thank her for making sure you wouldn't have to see a mess of tenses! I've rarely met someone so supportive and I'm so very grateful for it! Our conversations throughout S4 made the entire experience all the more lovely and I'm so glad you shared your amazing headcanons with me! I just want to thank you for everything!
> 
> I'm mrsbarlowswife on tumblr, where I happily blog about Black Sails and femslash.

Madi lets out a very un-regal groan as she enters her bedroom. It was once the Underhill’s bedroom where Mr Underhill, after a long harassing day of exploiting people (or making people exploit other people in case directly exploiting people was too harassing) would lie down with his wife and have more people tend to his needs. 

It was now hers.

It was the room where the dreadful Captain Flint once showed mercy to a woman and her child. And Billy showed less mercy. 

It didn’t matter now. 

She removes her shoes and lets her decorative shawl fall by the door before walking to the bed where she laid, closing her eyes, savouring how good it felt to be bare-footed in the oppressive and _dry_ heat of Nassau. They were deep inland enough not to feel the fresh breeze from the sea, but not deep enough to benefit from the quiet shade from the luxuriant vegetation of the island. 

Someone might, one day, benefit from the orchard she helped plant, but for now, the trees were way too small to shade anything. 

Everything felt like this. Like this orchard she helped plant, but would not see until she was much older, maybe as old as her mother had been when everything happened. It’s been three years and everything still felt like it was being built. And already, she could see the looming threat of war, and its familiar destruction. 

She could see it in the eyes of the defiant, of some members of the council, of a young man thrumming with energy and an uncomplicated worldview. She could see it, every time there was news of escaped slaves and in the prayers she made in hopes that they would not run here, where they would have to take them back. 

She could feel it in herself, boiling gently in her blood, ready for an uproar, like a fruit becoming ripe, ready to be picked. She didn’t want this treaty she had made, but there had been no good choices. 

There had been Julius and his men, and his men’s women and children, accepting the treaty, and there had been chaos in the pirates’ ranks. Chaos, not like a wonderful omnipotent apocalypse like she had hoped, but like the absurd dance of a headless chicken. 

Long John Silver had killed Captain Flint, and James McGraw had gone to live a happy life with Thomas Hamilton. Madi had tried, oh, how she had tried to forgive him. That had been so hard when, for all his patience for her, his mind kept drifting away to the man he could never forget. Their life together had only been sleepless nights where they stared at the ceiling, trying to swim towards each other in opposing currents. So Madi had sent a man to find James McGraw and Thomas Hamilton and had asked Silver to leave her and find them because she knew he would never make the decision himself. She had been raised, by her father, by her mother, by the war, to make the most difficult choices after all.

Madi had found some happiness too, she guessed. A bitter, bitter happiness which tasted like ash and dust in her mouth at the end of the day. Captain Flint had died, but his mad desire for vengeance, for war, for righting the wrongs, had not. It was sleeping in Madi, ready to pounce at the slightest provocation. 

But not today. Not today, Madi repeats in her head, in time with her breaths. She aches everywhere. From working on the new hut with the men to set an example, from arguing with the council, from officiating the burial of an old venerated man, from blessing the union that would take place in a week’s time, from writing letters to both Julius, and the new governor. From planting another tree in the orchard, but this hurt, she could feel in her back, was welcome and cherished. 

Her neck ached too, protesting the new position, after having been straight and stiff all day. Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown.

This is happiness, Madi repeats to herself, as she feels crushed, once again, by choices. By past wars lost. By uncertain wars to come. By the betrayal of the man she had loved. By the betrayal of the ally she had trusted. By responsibilities she was prepared to meet. It isn’t what she wanted and she feels it crushing her, slowly, with each passing day. 

“I know you’ve been working on the hut again.” 

No one would dare address her with that reproaching voice. Madi smiles. 

“They need support from their queen.” She answers lazily, still smiling. 

“I need support from the queen too, and that means no more clothes to give to the washing and hands to heal.” 

Madi rolls on her stomach to watch Eme pick her shawl up, dust it a little and fold it carefully for tomorrow. Madi feels crushed, but this woman here is the one reason why she doesn’t feel broken yet. 

Eme had known her father. He had set her free, and she had demonstrated a courage lots of men out there would envy since. And probably before, but Eme never wants to talk about it. Madi understands. 

Eme had been the head of the Maroon network in Nassau, assuring communication and the transfer of goods between here and the camp where Madi grew up. She was a founding member of the resistance in Nassau as soon as it started. She was Madi’s most trusted advisor, sitting quietly at her back during the meetings with the council, whispering advice in her ear, and proof-reading her letters. She was the dam that held her anger back. And she was the most wonderful healer. 

“Why are you looking at me like this?” Eme asks as she checked how much soap remained. 

“Thank you for keeping the blinds shut all day.” Madi answers, mumbling her words a little, which she would never do in front of anyone else. 

“I know how you like your room cool after a hot day of doing precisely what I advised you against.” Eme counters immediately, but there’s a smile in her words. 

No one would dare speak to her like that either. Eme herself would never have dreamed speaking to her like that three years ago when they first met. 

“Hop in your bath now. I’ll wash your hair.” 

Madi nods and stands, groaning a little as all of her muscles protest. The war and the rebuilding process had taken their toll on her body, and she could barely believe only three years had happened since she first met a young man with sharp blue eyes in a cage. She undresses, making an effort by folding her own clothes, and climbing in the welcome fresh water, barely warmed by the heat of the day. Madi folds her knees, closes her eyes and puts her head under the water to wet her hair and her face. 

Eme sits on a little stool by the bath tub’s side, looking at her with a smile: “I’ve barely seen you all day. How do you feel?” She asks softly, dipping the bar of soap in the water. 

“I feel sad for the old man’s family. I feel happy for those who will marry. I feel hopeful for the new hut. I feel angry against the council. But none of that matters now, because now I feel calm and peaceful with you.” 

Madi caresses the hand that is lathering soap on her neck and shoulders in quiet contemplation of how she truly feels. She doesn’t want to tell Eme about Silver or Flint, but she knows Eme would read her like an open book anyway. She never wants to hide emotions from Eme. 

Eme keeps silent as she washes her right arm, then her left arm in soft but efficient movements. She looks at her hands in disapproval and washes them too, the soap stinging the little cuts, washing away the dirt that remained. Madi doesn’t protest. She knows she deserves that. She can’t help but chuckle when Eme frowns at her like a disapproving mother. 

Queen Madi could never be taken care of, but Madi could, and she basks in the feeling. She lets Eme dip the soap in the water again and wash her sternum and her chest, between her breasts. She sighs with contentment. 

Queen Madi never had a husband and showed no sign of wanting one. Madi was mistrusting of any suitor. For the most part, she tended to forget she was not already married. 

Eme’s hands know her, they have travelled those paths again and again, and brought pleasure again and again. Madi can feel some calluses but they only heighten the pleasure, they make it more real. Madi can feel herself relax, her bones melting until they feel just like the cool water as Eme lathers soap over her skin in a gentle caress. When she cups her breasts, Madi gasps a little and feels heat start to come to her. Eme just hums quietly next to her. 

Madi can smell her. The nice oil that she uses on her skin in the mornings, before heading out, and still announces her at the end of the day. Something luscious, like leaves and sweat from the day. The undefinable smell of the throbbing sun. And the sweet almost cloying smell of the fruits Madi will feed her when they’re done in the bath. She likes that smell, it soothes her mind just as much as Eme’s hands. 

Madi does gasp a little louder when Eme starts playing with her nipples. They are quite sensitive, Eme had found out, and she does like to torture her so. So Eme first caresses them with the tips of her fingers before applying a bolder pressure with her thumbs, just the way she knows Madi likes. As her nipples harden under the touch, heat is now definitively pooling low in her stomach. 

“I missed you today,” Eme whispers against her ear, her breath making Madi shiver. 

“Me too… May I kiss you?” She asks because she can’t believe she hasn’t kissed her lover since this morning. 

Eme nods and Madi turns her face so their lips could meet. The angle is a little awkward and Madi knows she can’t turn her neck too long before it starts to ache all over again, so she decides to make every second count. 

Eme always starts her kisses gentle, just a press of lips against lips, like she was trying to rediscover her at each kiss. Madi decides she doesn’t have time for that and immediately latches on Eme’s full lower lip, sucking it into her mouth, tasting it with the same delight she had experienced the first time they kissed. Of course, it had been a timid, hesitant affair back then. It isn’t now. Eme answers and presses their lips together again so she can ask for entrance before gently deepening the kiss. 

Madi keeps her eyes closed and lets arousal wash over her. Eme gets lost in the kiss, her tongue exploring Madi’s mouth again. Madi lifts her head a little to meet her, sliding her tongue over Eme’s. Eme sighs and twist her mouth away to breathe. Madi groans in protest and Eme laughs kindly at her, cup her breasts once again, making Madi’s back arch. 

“Now, you can decide,” Eme whispers in her ear, “do you want to come here in the bath or on the bed?”

“In the bath,” Madi answers immediately. 

She loves how Eme smiles at her. The kindness in her amazing brown eyes. The magnificent curve of her lips. Madi’s heart never seems to stop finding sustenance in that smile. Eme nods and takes the bar of soap again.

“Why?” Madi asks, frowning. 

“You still need to clean yourself up.” Eme answers with her calm, patient tone.

So Eme cleans Madi up. More like teases her to death, but Madi knows it will be quicker to just accept her fate and wait until Eme is finished. She lets Eme’s expert hands slide over her stomach, rubbing her hips in a teasing promise Madi knows she will fulfill. 

Eme taps her thigh and Madi lifts her leg so Eme can clean the dirt of the day. Eme rubs her calf a little, to soothe the weariness, moving upwards, lathering sweet-smelling soap as she goes. When she finished with one leg, Eme sneaks a kiss on her big toe which makes Madi cock an eyebrow, daring her to go further. 

Eme just shakes her head and taps her other leg. As she treats it with the same patience and thoroughness, Madi lets it relax her. There will be time to tense and tremble at the hands of her lover later. For now, she is glad to finally let every thought go. She closes her eyes and lets her head fall back against the side of the tub. Her neck still aches a little but her head feels lighter and she finds herself not frowning.

Eme’s magic touch. 

When Eme finishes with her legs, she moves to her back but Madi groans wordlessly because now that she is here, she’s too comfortable to move. 

“Am I your mother?” Eme jokes. Madi laughs a little and moves her head to Eme’s shoulder while she washes her back. 

With her eyes closed, Madi can hear and feel everything. She finds herself enraptured by Eme’s breathing pattern. How calm it is. How soothing. She loves feeling her breath on her temple where the scar still hurts her. Their breath, along with the ripples of the water, are the only noises in the room. Madi revels in the quietness.

“I’ll spare you the hair so we can proceed, is that alright?” Eme asks finally. 

Madi opens her eyes and nods most eagerly. 

“Alright, sweetheart, spread your legs for me.” Eme whispers again. 

Madi immediately obeys, bending her knees and opening her legs as wide as the bathtub allows. She hears Eme murmur a “Good” under her breath and goes to ask for another kiss. 

This one is more passionate. For all her patience, Eme wants this as much as Madi does. Eme is sitting on her stool next to Madi now and she kisses her like she’s been hungry for it all day. Madi answers it, biting Eme’s lower lip to taste it better. Eme licks her teeth and Madi opens up for her. 

She then gasps because Eme’s hand has found her way between her thighs and, oh, how her fingers are agile. 

She remembers the first time they did this. Madi had felt lost, scared, unsure. She has been trying and trying to come to terms with what was happening to her. It felt like she had been deposed and yet was still expected to act as a queen. She was being asked to enforce terms she had never agreed upon in the first place. 

The entire world seemed to be a dark and cruel place, full of stolen joys and suffering. She felt like she was clutching at a world constantly tipping over. She was always tired. The smallest of smiles exhausted her. But for all this fatigue, she could barely sleep. She wished, alone at night in her bed, that someone would come to help her. That her father was here, imparting her words of wisdom in his deep calm voice. That Flint was here, with his thoughtfulness and the rage thrumming in his veins that went straight to her head and never failed to push her forward, despite the pain, despite the fear, despite the exhaustion. There were gone now. Both of them. 

She had been alone, until Eme found her. Her calm, quiet voice asking her if she wanted to eat. Then insisting that she did. 

Then asking her if she had trouble sleeping. Then asking her to try this tea she had made that would help her sleep, at least a little, before she could drop with exhaustion. 

Then asking her how she felt about that man in the council crossing her. How she felt about that new deal with the cotton providers in Nassau. 

Then asking her if crying on someone’s shoulder would make grief a little less cutting. If she could allow herself not to be so lonely all the time. 

Queen Madi leads her people and takes all the decisions they need her to take. But Madi has never lead her relationship with Eme. She had just nodded past her unshed tears and let Eme take her hand to guide her with a kindness she had forgotten still existed. 

Eme’s hand between her legs starts slow, at the same pace she had taken when she had washed her. It also has the same movement. Rubbing in slow circles. It almost lulls Madi, keeping warmth pooling her belly slowly, like honey dripping into a larger pool of honey. Madi feels her breathing deepen as heat slowly spreads through her. 

Eme’s fingers explore her again, spreading her, caressing her in long languid movements. Madi looks up at Eme who was focusing on her task, watching her own hand disappearing under the surface of the water and Madi’s chest rise and fall. That made Madi even wetter. She loved how Eme watched her, always. 

Eme’s fingers find their way to her clitoris and Madi gasps. Here, her caresses are more insistent. Madi feels her skin become tighter and blood run hot in her veins. She both wants to close her thighs to keep Eme’s hand against her and open them further in the hopes of getting more of Eme’s touch. More, more, _more_. 

Eme caresses circles around her clit, rubbing her in an easy rhythm that makes Madi moan. She feels need gather in her chest, in her stomach, making her move her hips in the pursuit of it. She licks her lips before moaning again as Eme’s fingers slide down on her folds before coming back to the center of her. 

“That’s good. Let go for me.” Eme whispers again. Her lips are so, so close, and Madi needs to kiss them now. 

She definitively does. not. whine. for a kiss. She still gets it. It is messy and a little too wet. It sounds obscene, just like the ripples of the water lapping with their combined movements. Madi sucks on Eme’s tongue, then on her upper lip, then on her lower one. She can feel the cloud of arousal dull any rational part of her brain and pushing her to look for more. She is riding Eme’s fingers, rolling her hips to follow her movements. 

“Eme…” She calls, her lips dragging against her lover’s. She can feel it rise and rise inside her, like the tides. She is almost there. 

Eme’s movements become more urgent. It feels so good. So good. Madi can’t help but moan again, quite loud, but she can’t bring herself to care. She just wants. She wants Eme’s fingers against her always, and she craves the climax at the same time. 

Then she feels it. The edge. She feels it in the way her toes are curling and her thighs are digging in the sides of the bathtub, trying to offer more access, trying to get more. She feels it in her heartbeat, going faster and faster until it becomes slow. She feels it in the disjointed rhythm of her hips as she pursues the pleasure Eme’s fingers draw out of her.

She feels it in the encouragements of her lover: “Yes, yes, that’s it. Let go. Let go for me, I got you. You’re so beautiful Madi. So utterly beautiful and perfect…”

Madi comes with one hand clutching at the edge of the bathtub, the other at Eme’s shoulder, the name of her lover like a mantra on her breathless lips. 

After a few minutes… It feels like a few minutes, but honestly, Madi can’t focus on anything as trivial as time passing as she comes down. Her breath is coming back to normal and her heartbeat is slowing down. Her toes relax and her legs slide down in the water. Eme withdraws her hand before Madi gets over-sensitive and, as Madi relaxes her grip on her shoulder, she raises a hand to caress Madi’s cheek. 

Madi opens her eyes to watch her lover. How beautiful she is. How graceful she looks. How lucky she is to have Eme tend to her. To be the one Eme chose. 

Madi immediately rises up in a waterfall. She steps out of the tub and takes Eme’s hand in hers. She still has the tingling sensation of blood rushing back to her legs and her feet after the force of her orgasm, but she just cannot wait. 

She feels it, the craving, like the hunger you have for a certain fruit that has a certain taste. It makes her rub her tongue on her own palate. She needs it. Eme laughs a little, following her to the bed. Water has splashed all over her skirt and both her arms are beaded with the bath water. 

Madi’s movements are admittedly a little erratic as she undresses Eme. Then she pushes her gently on the bed and admires how she looks, sprawled on her bed. Her red beaded necklace draws up to her neck and frames her perfect collarbones. Her breasts are so sumptuous that Madi can’t help but straddle her and mouth directly at them. 

“No, you’re still wet from the bath…The sheet…” Eme tries to protest as her hands find their way to Madi’s hair, holding on to her. Madi loves this. This movement. Eme clutching at her. Holding her. 

She laps at her nipples before letting her teeth graze at them, just to hear Eme gasp and press against her, asking for more, just like she did, not so long ago. 

Madi cups her lover’s breasts a little but she doesn’t linger here. The time for teasing has passed and she slides down Eme’s body, planting ravenous kisses all over her skin. She doesn’t stop until she is kneeling on the floor and has Eme’s legs on her shoulders. 

She can smell her and it’s driving her crazy. She does take the time to kiss the inside of her thighs because she knows how Eme likes it. There had been days where Eme had sat against the headboard, legs over Madi’s shoulders and she had kissed, bit, and licked her thighs for hours, discovering them, confining them to memory. 

But today, Madi can’t kiss her way down her thighs quickly enough. She licks Eme’s folds, already wet with desire. Eme hisses and arches her back a little, thighs tensing. Madi caresses them with her thumbs and continues licking, letting her tongue part her folds and taste her. 

Madi licks her way up to Eme’s clit which she kisses lightly, just to hear her gasp and feel her hands tighten in her hair. She teases it with her pointed tongue, slippery with how wet Eme is already. It won’t take long, sadly. Madi licks at her with her flattened tongue, setting a quick and powerful pace that has her loses her breath again. 

Eme’s thighs tighten around her face, holding Madi against her. Madi can feel her hips roll against her, chasing her own orgasm. She lets Eme ride her face, licking at her, again and again, tasting her and listening to her moans with rapture. 

Eme comes against her tongue with the most beautiful broken moan. Her legs become slack on her shoulders again and Madi holds them on her shoulders, caressing them, savouring how soft they feel under her palms. 

Only when she is certain that Eme has regained her breath, Madi lets her legs go and climbs up the bed. Eme looks gorgeous, spread on her bed, beads of sweat on her forehead and between her breasts. She could look at her chest rise and fall for ages, but her eyes are way more fascinating. They look at her with a tenderness Madi had thought she would never experience again. They bring her unexpected hope in herself. If Eme believes in her, then how could she do wrong? 

She caresses Eme’s cheek with the back of her hand and smiles at her. Eme returns the smile and Madi feels warmth and happiness bloom in her chest. She feels like she has been given a gift in the form of Eme’s rare and graceful smile. 

“Look who’s in need of a bath now,” she teases her lover. 

“Please give me a minute, I feel like I’ve just been ravaged by a wild animal.” Eme jokes which makes Madi smile until her cheeks hurt. “Next time, you need to go down on me where I can see you.” She adds quietly. 

“I didn’t want to climb up in bed all wet from the bath. I’ve been told you needed support from your queen.” Madi answers with a smile. 

“Maybe you should have thought of that before you straddled me.” Eme retorts, showing her a wet spot on the sheet by her side. 

“It’s so hot and dry out there it will dry before you know it.” Madi promises with fake innocent smile. 

“You’re lucky you’re so pretty and I can’t be mad at you.” Eme answers with a smile.

Madi nods and kisses Eme. It’s short and sweet, both still a little out of breath, but it feels like the world. Madi closes her eyes and makes a wish to never forget it. 

***

Later, Eme is sitting in the bath, washing her own legs while Madi is watching her, sitting on the little stool, chin hooked over the edge of the bathtub. Madi watches, fascinated, as Eme lathers soap on her skin, the arch of her foot as beautiful as the engravings of Greek goddesses she had seen in her father’s impressive library. 

“I know what torments you, Madi.” Eme interrupts her thoughts. 

“Oh?” Madi answers, raising her eyebrows. 

“You won’t rest until you have revenge.” 

“It’s… It’s not just revenge. You know I can’t accept the treaty as it is. A treaty that has been made without me and that I have to enforce.”

Eme looks down at the water and she gets lost in whatever she sees here: “I wish I could…” She swallows. “I wish I could ask you to be happy now, here, with me. But I won’t ask you. I promise I won’t… I just want you to know… That, whatever you decide to do, wherever you decide to go, I’ll be with you. I won’t just… watch you in silence. I’ll follow you and do my best to deliver you to the victory you chase as safely as possible.”

Madi feels her throat constrict. She bites her lip and whispers: “I wish I wouldn’t require that of you.”

“It doesn’t matter now, Madi. It doesn’t matter. I believe in what you defend. I believe in you. I’ll follow you wherever you lead.” Madi’s hand takes Eme’s soap-covered one and holds it tight, looking for trust, strength, and love.

On Eme’s shoulder, the head that wears the crown lies a little more easily.


End file.
